Che Library and the Lecture 


By aoe 4 a OK SP NTT OE N 


Paper prepared for the 
Meeting of ‘Texas Library Association 


at Waco May 8 and g, 1906 














Reprinted from Public Litbraries—:gob 





02\. 43 
p zi 


The Library and the Lecture* 


Frank C. Patten, librarian of Rosenberg li- 
brary, Galveston, Texas 


During the last few vears there has 
been an active and increasing interest 
in various parts of the country in popu- 
lar instructive lectures. Texas is show- 
ing her interest in an energetic manner, 
and it is a pleasure to report on the 
progress that is being made. 

Libraries have, during the last third 
_of acentury, grown greatly in number 
- and their field of activity has been very 
“greatly enlarged, but hitherto public 
‘lectures have not become a common 
“feature of library work. Now there is 
“an awakening of interest and a growing 
* sense of the splendid possibilities of 
public usefulness in this direction. 
-1\Where public school authorities have 

not taken up the popular lecture as an 
educational work (and this is being 
done in many cities) the public libraries 
have sometimes found it possible, even 
with their extremely limited resources, 
to do something to encourage lectures, 





*Presented at meeting of Texas library association at 
Waco, May 8-9. 1906. 


3 


p 10356 


even if there is no lecture hall in the li- 
brary building. I anticipate that library 
authorities will more and more see the 
importance of this public educational 
work as experience from year to year 
demonstrates its great value in our com- 
munities. 

The public library is the one educa- 
tional institution in the community that 
is very broad and universal in its scope. 
It is for all ages and all conditions and 
it properly embraces in its concern, at 
least in a general way, the higher and 
supremely important human interests. 
The public library is the natural center 
in the town for those intellectual activ- 
ities that make for scholarship, culture, 
progress, better information and the 
general public good. And so it is very 
proper that educational lectures should 
be encouraged and supported under li- 
brary auspices as much as possible. and 
to a growing extent. Library lectures 
should be popular and interesting with- 
out being merely entertaining and triv- 
ial; they should be plain and simple 
without attempting the ornate and the 
oratorical. The instructive lecture, sim- 
ple, interesting, dignified, is the one 
that is most appropriate for the public 
library. 

The lecture that is a mere entertain- 
ment or is largely so, such as we can 


4 


generally obtain through the lyceum 
bureaus, is a kind of lecture, it seems to 
me, that had better be managed some 
other way than under library auspices 
or by special library encouragement. 
The instructive lecture is a more digni- 
fied and appropriate one for libraries to 
interest themselvesin. Thereally good 
oratorical lecture has a splendid place 
to fill. The great orator of lofty aims 
nobly inspires and persuades, and he 
confers a high enjoyment. Such elo- 
quence is for a large audience and a 
fare occasion, rather than for’ the 
smaller audience connected with the 
every-day educational work of the pub- 
lic library. Oratory that is other than 
the best is liable to seem cheap, and a 
library is in danger of cheapening itself 
by connection with it. 

I think it should be clearly borne in 
mind that it is the instructive, popular 
lecture that we, as librarians, are espe- 
cially interested in. It is the lecture 
that is informing and serves the ends of 
culture, and so has a-true educative 
value that is properly linked with libra- 
ries. The lecture that broadens the 
outlook, clarifies the vision, enlarges 
the resources of the individual, and so 
enriches life, is the kind of lecture that 
is appropriate in connection with that 


5 


dignified educational institution that we 
name a public library. 

The kind of lecture and the standard 
of excellence that we are to attract to 
our libraries are matters of great im- 
portance. Allow me to make some 
statements about the ideal of the Ro- 
senberg library by quoting a few para- 
graphs from a lecture circular: 

‘In establishing the Rosenberg library 
as a free educational institution for the 
general benefit of the public in fulfill- 
ment of the purposes of Mr Rosenberg’s 
bequest, the directors, besides providing 
for the other departments of library ac- 
tivity, have also recognized the great 
practical and cultural benefit to be de- 
rived from frequent, instructive, popu- 
lar lectures. As in all the work of the 
institution, the primary aim of the lec- 
ture department is educational. We 
hope it will be possible for us to provide 
lectures equal to the best given in other 
cities, and to establish in Galveston a 
lectureship that shall be recognized for 
its high value. We believe that there 
are great possibilities of public useful- 
ness through ‘lectures upon practical, 
literary and scientific subjects.’ 

‘We hope that it will be found pos- 
sible, from time to time as there is op- 
portunity, to enlist as lecturers strong 
and able men of university standing, 


6 


and others of equal learning and power. 
We expect to invite to our platform 
eminent men of high qualifications in 
the various walks of life whose study 
and experience have brought to them 
authoritative information and the power 
to inspire. As we are ata distance from 
the centers of education and learning 
and industrial activity, it will be no easy 
task to secure the high quality of public 
service that we desire. But travelers 
come this way on journeys to Mexico 
and California, and business, mild cli- 
mate or recreation brings to our city 
leaders of thought and action. Many 
are now being attracted to Galveston 
through interest in the great public en- 
gineering enterprises that are lifting 
the city into prominence—-the making 
by jetties and by dredging of a great 
harbor, the protecting of the island by 
an extensive and very costly sea wall, 
and the perfecting of the city’s security 
by a grade-raising enterprise of great 
magnitude. Among those who pass our 
way some may be induced by our invi- 
tation to spend an extra day or two in 
order to meet our people and favor us 
with one or more lectures. 

“While it is desired that the Rosen- 
berg- library free lectures (and all are to 
be free) shall be interesting and popu- 
lar in the best sense, and frequently 1l- 


7 


lustrated with the stereopticon, yet we 
expect them to be of such high order as 
to attract and instruct the thoughtful 
and the studious. The inspiring and 
‘practical lectures that we aim to provide 
are such as have become so popular in 
a number of cities within a few years, 
the best examples of which are prob- 
ably the 4000 or 5000 lectures held 
yearly in New York city under the au- 
thority of the board of education, with 
an attendance that has grown from 
small beginnings, 17 years ago, until it 
now aggregates over a million each 
year. 


“It is also desired to cover a wide 
range of subjects of general interest. 
Literature, education, art, travel, his- 
tory, government, finance and econom- 
ics will receive their share of attention. 
The natural and physical sciences in 
their popular aspects, the various indus- 
tries, especially of our own state and 
country, commerce by land and sea, 
engineering, municipal affairs, charities, 
important new movements and events, 
and all timely topics of the work and 
thought of the present-day world are 
considered very desirable subjects for 
our lectures, especially where these lec- 
tures can be illustrated objectively or 
with the stereopticon. 


“The library encourages and pro- 
8 


motes courses of reading and studious 
work in connection with these instruct- 
ive lectures. Special attention is given 
to preparing select and annotated lists 
of the best books published on the sub- 
jects of our lectures and, if occasion re- 
quires, additional copies of the most 
important books are bought for the li- 
brary.. Eventually, if university exten- 
sion work can be more fully carried out 
with its full course of lectures and its 
regular study features, the advantages 
of a well-selected library with free ac- 
cess to the shelves and good reference 
department service will be very ap- 
parent.” 


The women’s study clubs of Texas, 
that have already done so much for 
Texas libraries, have also done a splen- 
did public service by bringing into the 
state, from time to time, capable lectur- 
ers whose good quality of work appeals 
to those who have the burden of library 
interests in their charge. It has been 
recognized in Texas, as elsewhere, that 
in order to get the best results from li- 
brary lectures we need to make the 
work as systematic as possible and en- 
courage as much as possible serious 
reading and study in connection with 
the lectures. If in each of our towns 
we can provide lectures that come one 
week apart and have them given in a 


9 


course—a connected course, not simply 
a series—of several lectures all upon 
the same general subject, we in the li- 
braries can then prepare lists of books 
upon that subject and encourage con- 
siderable thoughtful reading every week 
during the lecture course, as well as be- 
fore and after it. Systematic lecture 
work counts better towards a satisfying 
achievement, while work of the miscel- 
laneous, random sort seems more like 
work that begins nowhere, has no defi- 
nite direction and arrives nowhere, and 
it. has comparatively little permanent 
result. I think that I am voicing the 
sentiment of the members of this asso- 
ciation when I say that the kind of lec- 
tures that we want is something that 
approaches as near as may be to what 
is known as the university extension 
course of six or more weekly lectures. 
upon ‘one subject, by one professor, with 
syllabus, popular review, weekly class 
exercise, etc., and with university credit 
to those who enroll themselves as stu- 
dents and do the required work. 

After a great deal of effort by corre- 
spondence, in the state and elsewhere, 
extending over two years’ time and 
more, it was found possible to get the 
University of Chicago to send one of 
their very best university extension lec- 
turers, Prof. J. G. Carter Troop, into 


10 


Texas for a course of six university ex- 
tension lectures upon the Great novel- 
ists of the nineteenth century It was 
exceedingly fortunate that we were able 
to secure the services of. Professor 
Troop, who has had a long and very 
successful experience in just the kind of 
work that we in Texas desire. A circuit 
of Texas cities was formed and at 
weekly intervals the course of six lec- 
tures was given by Professor Troop in 
Houston, San Antonio, Dallas and Gal- 
veston. Three weekly lectures were 
given at Nacogdoches and single lec- 
tures were given at other places. The 
time of the lecturer was fully occupied 
for the whole six weeks and he was 
obliged to leave the state to fill other 
engagements without meeting all of the 
calls upon him for single lectures. 


At Galveston the lectures were held 
under the auspices of the board of di- 
rectors of the Rosenberg library. The 
lectures were free, the capacity of the 
library lecture hall (600 seats) was over- 
taxed, and there was a growing interest 
and satisfaction to the very end. In 
the other cities I understand that the 
attendance was good, and that it was 
easy to sell enough tickets to more than 
pay the $250 to the University of Chi- 
cago for the lectures, a price that is very 
moderate for a course of such high 


11 


merit. In all of the cities where the 
full course was given there was more or 
less of the regular features of univer- 
sity extension—review, class exercise, 
paper writing, required reading and 
preparation for examination in order to 
obtain credit from the University of 
Chicago for the work done. 

For the first year of the more syste- 
maticlecture work of the instructive kind 
it seems to me that the achievement is | 
very considerable. The Texas library 
association may feel a pride in the fact 
that the Texas libraries have entered 
this important field of library effort and 
that already there are excellent results. 
There is now a good prospect, I under- 
stand, that the University of Chicago 
will send Professor Troop into Texas 
again next winter for another six weeks, 
perhaps to begin early in January. In 
Galveston we have chosen a course in 
Shakespeare for our next winter’s work, 
provided we are able to obtain the ser- 
vices of Professor Troop. I think that 
it is along the line of effort that I have 
been describing that we are most likely 
to secure for Texas the best available 
public lectures—instructive, systematic, 
of a high order of merit, and at a price 
that it is possible to pay—lectures that 
are really worthy of our efforts. Such 
lectures can only be obtained, however, 


12 


and towns in order to form a lecture 
circuit. 1 should like to see the codp- 
eration of this year continued, so that 
-we Can have at least one course of six 
university extension lectures every year. 

The Rosenberg {library found it pos- 
sible this year to get professors of the 
University of Texas to come to Galves- 
ton to deliver single lectures. During 
February we had with us Dean Mezes, 
ipeeeneaicy Dr Battle and Dr Keas- 
bey. We appreciate most sincerely this 
cooperation on the part of the State 
university with our efforts to benefit the 
public. These lectures were highly ap- 
preciated by large audiences, and we 
hope to get more lectures by the State 
university professors next year. I un- 
derstand that other towns have sent tn- 
vitations to professors at Austin and so 
have had the privilege of good lectures, 
some of them illustrated by stereopti- 
con views. I should like to see our own 
State university do more and more of 
.this kind of work and so bring the unt- 
versity into close touch with the public 
libraries and the public schools all over 
the state. 

It thus appears that the lecture out- 
look in Texas is very encouraging. In 
the larger towns of the state it seems 
quite possible to obtain at least one 
good course of six university extension 


13 


good course of six university extension 
lectures each year, and in the smaller 
towns a less number may, to a limited 
extent, be secured in accordance with 
the local wishes and financial possibil- 
ities. And I hope that the University 
of Texas, and perhaps other Texas in- 
stitutions, may find it possible to re- 
spond to many, if not all, the invita- 
tions that may be sent in from Texas 
library and school authorities. 


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